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Wednesday, December 7, 2016

Advent...Ever...New

Advent 2016, never before,
never again, has come to us, here and now, with an eternal newness. A newness
that always challenges us to put on a new set of lenses so we will have
the faith and courage to let go of the certainty and the security of the
past. For what purpose? So we can free ourselves to be lost in The Mystery
that is "ever ancient and ever new." A mystery we are celebrating,
anew, this Advent season, but the question has to be asked are we ready for the
newness? There is an eternal newness to our living God. As we participate in
this newness there must be a newness that is revealed in us and through us, for
others. What we are given is never for ourselves. (St. Paul)This newness is presented in the
every ordinary, yet, ever new moment, we are given to live. It is in the living
of each moment that the living God, of Jesus the Christ comes to us and through
us to all of creation. This is The Great Advent which is forever happening, in
the sacrament of eternal now. The coming, this advent of God which is a moment
to moment reality, is the mystery we spend four weeks reflecting on each and
every year. The purpose of this reflective time is to a deeper our faith in the
newness of our God. Because of the newness of our God there must be a newness
within each one of us, since in Him/Her "we live and move and have our
being." How exciting, how challenging that reality is??? Are we ready to
embrace the challenge, of leaving behind comfort and certainty so as to journey
into the great unknown of faith?

“We are driven blindly along a path we have never seen or heard of, unable to
venture any other. Divine action never follows the same course; it always
traces out new paths. Those whom it leads NEVER know where they are going; they
will not find the way through or by their own searching. Divine action for ever
opens the way which we are compelled to take." J-P De Caussade. My ego
wants no part of this insecurity and uncertainty. My ego wants the security of
certainty, and when that certainty disappears, which it will; there is serious
fear-filled panic. On the other hand, my spirit wants to fly free into the
unknown. To be blown this way and that way by the breath of The Creative Spirit
of Love. The Holy Spirit is the creative power of our God, creating and
recreating us ever anew. The Creator God is forever molding us and shaping us
into the person we are meant to be, not the person we want, or wish to be. The
Model we are modeled after is coming to dwell among us. He is coming to be
enfleshed within our flesh, which is The Mystery of the Incarnation. Through
this mystery we are provided with a living, and so an ever evolving model to
follow. We cannot enter a newness of life being modeled after some dead
inanimate object. When we make this error we pay a terrible price. Our Eternal,
Living God comes to live among us so as to lead us to live lives way
beyond anything our imagination could ever imagine. Lives that are only possible
through the action of Grace. Grace, we know, is the love of God in action. That
action is always within the reality of the here and now. Once we go outside the
reality of the here and now God cannot reach us. We are not disposing ourselves
for the only encounter that really matters. For that we are responsible, the
gift of free will can be such a blessing, but it also can be such a curse. All
gifts follow the same pattern.

This Spirit, then, blows where It wills, and in the way of its own choosing.
Darn it. This Spirit cannot be programmed to fit our little narrow
agenda. This requires of us a constant state of awareness and alertness to the
battle that, of necessity, will, and does, ensue. It is happening right now in the
depths of who we are. It is a moment to moment struggle which results in the
old passes away, to give way to the birthing of the new. This too, in time,
will lead to a newness which we must make room for. So, in every life is sown
the seeds of death, in every death there is in potency, the reality of new
life. This new life will be nourished into the fullness of life through the
miracle of grace, not by anything we may say or do. I am beginning to
appreciate more and more the words of St.
John of The Cross, “We journey to Him we do not know,
a path we do not know.” Our journey, in faith, is then a journey into the
darkness of insecurity, and uncertainty. A journey that somehow is guided and
guarded by a power beyond our understanding and comprehension. A book, I find
both challenging, and unsettling, is 'The Sacrament of the Present Moment"
by Jean-Pierre De Caussade. Writing about this journey into the darkness of
faith he has this to say “Those who find themselves this way are often afraid,
like the prophet, to follow it afraid of running into danger when walking
through that darkness. Have no fear faithful souls! That is where your path
lies, the way along which your God is guiding you. THERE IS NOTHING SAFER OR
SURER THAN THE DARK NIGHT OF FAITH. Following in any way when faith is so
obscure and darkness obliterates everything and the path can no longer be
discerned, for a path cannot be lost which does not exist. But the soul cries
out: "Every moment I seem to be falling down a precipice. I know I am
surrendering myself to God that I can achieve nothing unless I cease to act on
the strength of my own virtue.....I cannot see that it is guiding me in the
right direction, but I cannot prevent myself from believing that it is"...The
state of pure faith is the state of pure suffering. All is dark, all is
pain.... The more pitfalls there are, the more darkness, danger, mortification,
dryness, fear, privation, trouble, anguish, despair, persecution, suffering, and
desolation there is on our way, the more our faith and trust will be
strengthened...We will forget the way and all its twists and turns, we will
forget ourselves and totally surrender to the wisdom, the mercy, and the power
of our guide.

This Guide is coming to us, disguised as a helpless, vulnerable baby. We are on
an endless searching journey. A mysterious journey that will take us beyond
that which is seen into the realm of mystery and the unseen. This Advent
let us look beyond the familiar so as to get in touch with the great unseen.
This unseen is our deepest and most sacred reality. Let us take the familiar
characters of the Gospel story, and see where each makes a dwelling place
within us. As you place the figures of your crib scene, search your inner space
for the place where they are now dwelling. They are patiently waiting, and have
been waiting in your depths, so as to be discovered and become living
realities. In this way you as individual, couples, families, will have the
lived experience of what it means to be, the living continuation of The Mystery
of The Incarnation.